Mobile touchscreen-enabled communication devices, such as smartphones (sometimes referred to as application phones) and tablet computers, are capable of running applications (e.g., educational, gaming, financial, and utility applications) that are useful in a variety of contexts. Increasingly, it is becoming more typical that these mobile communication devices include sensors such as touchscreens, accelerometers, and microphones to detect a user's actions, and applications have been developed that, to a limited extent, utilize some aspects of these sensors.
In addition, these mobile communication devices are often able to communicate, both over cellular communication links and over shorter-range communication links such as one or more of Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, radio-frequency identification (RFID), and near filed communication (NFC) links. Although applications have been developed to utilize these shorter-range communication links, these shorter-range communication links are currently underutilized and are not realizing their useful potential.
As a consequence, the potential for an enhanced user experience with these mobile communication devices is not currently being realized, at least, in part because the sensors (that operate as user interfaces) and the shorter-range communication capabilities of mobile communication devices are being underutilized.